Chapter 1

17 year old Tara Lener is beautiful and rich. She has everything she could ever want and can get anything she could ever need. Except for one thing, love. Tara is closeted, and has never once dated someone she truly liked. She only dated to hide her secret, because her parents were revolted by the LGBTQIA+ community. They despised them, called them sinners and used slurs when referring to them. Tara could never tell them that she was a part of the community. It would ruin her family and they would never forgive her for simply being herself. But recently, Tara found it harder and harder to hide it, because a new student had recently arrived at her school. The gorgeous and pridefully out, Sienna Wells. For now, Tara was only friends with Sienna. But the more time they spent together, the bigger the fire got from that one spark from the first day they met. It was Sienna's first day and she had gotten lost in the halls, Tara was on her way to the bathroom and saw Sienna with a confused look so she offered assistance. But when their eyes met she felt something she had never felt before, and Sienna felt it too. It felt as though they had known each other forever and would know each other for the rest of their lives, living in comfortable familiarity. Tara helped Sienna find her class then gave her her number, and they'd texted and called each other every night since then. Tara really liked Sienna, and Sienna really liked Tara. They enjoyed talking and spent all their time getting to know each other. They exchanged secrets and jokes and conversation, Tara even came out to Sienna, because she thought she could trust her, but what she didn't know was how bad of an idea trusting someone you just met was. The day it all happened, Tara wasn't feeling well. She had diagnosed depression and sometimes her condition got so bad that she had to take a day off of school. She was just trying to rest when suddenly she heard a notification on her phone, then another, then 3 more, then her phone was going off uncontrollably. She grabbed it to see what the hell was going on and that's when her stomach dropped. Everyone in school had been added to a text chain, and the first thing sent to it was a screenshot of the coming out text she had sent to Sienna. She was horrified. The whole school now knew her secret and soon enough it would get out to her parents, but she never could have guessed that her parents were the first people it was sent to. They stormed upstairs and started to yell at Tara, calling her slurs and telling her god would never forgive her. She started to cry, and the tears just wouldn't stop. She sobbed as her parents yelled, she sobbed when they left, and she sobbed as the notifications of people making fun of her on the text chain kept coming in, and she sobbed as she went into her bathroom, grabbed a knife, and held it to her wrists. Her parents were downstairs talking about what to do when they heard a thud and ran upstairs. They screamed when they saw Tara lying on the floor bleeding. Her mother called 911 as her father ran to grab a towl to use to try to stop the bleeding. Pretty soon an ambulance was at their house. Tara was alive but weak, they put her on a stretcher and loaded her into the ambulance, then took her to the nearest hospital where she recovered until she woke up. When she did her parents were there, their eyes were red from crying and when they saw she was awake they called for a doctor and started crying again, this time tears of joy. When they doctor came he told Tara that she lost some blood but was going to be ok, and that's when Tara started crying and repeatedly saying no. She wanted to be dead, she didn't want to live with the pain. The doctors decided to deliver a psychological evaluation and determined she was too unstable to go home, and would be receiving a placement at a mental health hospital. The next day, her placement was confirmed and she was put in transport. She was terrified about going, but little did she know how amazing her situation would turn out.